A/N: Thank YOU to BoandNora-ItsOneWord, 4gcrazyme, ShanRB, HavenSM, and Guest for reviewing! You all are great! I love hearing your thoughts on this and hope you all continue to enjoy!

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Frisco Jones tapped on the door to Katherine's dressing room and heard a falsely bright "just a second!" before swinging the door open…in time to see her lowering a tissue from her face and start nonchalantly applying lipstick. He wasn't fooled.

"Where did you go?" he asked as the door thudded shut behind him.

Kate was shaking her head apologetically, her face studiously lowered as he came closer.

"Hm?"

"Oh, God, I'm really sorry—sorry I missed the last set, I had to do something important… How'd it go?" She said the words like a script, her chin tucked down, and Frisco knew she was trying to hide any clue of where she had been and what she'd been doing…but the spy-singer zeroed in right on the tell: her naked ring finger. Grabbing her wrist gently, he lifted it.

"Where's your engagement ring?"

There was a pause in which her composed demeanor fell to pieces and he dropped her wrist.

"Aw, Katherine!" Frisco burst out. "Come on, don't tell me that you did this—that you, you gave into your feelings about Robert and Anna? That's so stupid!"

Katherine was sniffling, distraught but resolute. "I just did…I did what I had to do."

"We just talked about this! Remember? We discussed this!"

Just earlier that night, in fact.

Frisco almost thought that saying "studded leather bra" would be too much…but Katie didn't snap out of it. She continued twirling a ring of hair around her finger, troubling over something like it was going out of style.

"That sounds good," she said distractedly and Frisco frowned at her.

"There's a problem, you're not listening to me. What's the matter?" He bent closer to her and half-smiled, hoping that little-boy antics might lead her to a confession. There were enough dear friends keeping secrets from him at the moment and Kate wasn't going to be another on the list. No way.

"We're about ready to go on, what's the matter?"

"Guess!" Kate snapped and rose from her chair. That fiery, beautiful energy would be good for the performance, but whatever set her off wasn't good. As she strode off towards the table and poured herself some water, Frisco did some quick thinking and came to the most obvious conclusion.

"Robert's going to be late…"

Kate clanged the pitcher down and grinned sarcastically at her singing partner. "Good guess—but! He had Robin call and tell me that, that he's gonna be late."

"Well, so what?" Frisco raised his eyebrows. That was pretty standard. Robin was Robert's daughter, after all…

Kate took a swallow of water and turned back to Frisco, eyes wide in annoyance. "So what? This always happens!"

"Well, what is he doing? I mean…"

"I don't know!" Kate declared, her voice high and incredulous. She had clearly needed to vent about this for a while…

"How should I know?!" She raised a pointed finger and started pacing past the younger man, and Frisco knew that the crux of the issue was coming. "I bet ya anything though, it has something to do with Anna…"

He stared dumbly for a second and then turned to follow her movement. "Anna."

"Yeah."

Frisco was taken a little aback. "You're not jealous of Anna?!"

The idea was incomprehensible to Frisco…not necessarily because he couldn't see Robert and Anna as a couple. It was common knowledge that they had been together before either of them were in Port Charles and they had done some undercover work posed as a couple. But now it had been years, and for all the gossip and innuendo…nothing serious had ever happened. You would think that Katherine would be secure since after all of this time and with the added incentive of Robin, the two had never even appeared to flirt with the idea of an actual reunion (no, he couldn't account for the time when he was with the WSB, but Anna was married to Duke then…). And as long as Frisco had been around, Katherine had certainly never seemed jealous of Anna before…

But Kate threw up her hands in defeat of the point. "Yes. Maybe I am!"

"That is ridiculous, Katie, what—"

"I know, I know, I know, I know, it's ridiculous, but that doesn't keep me from feeling that way!" Kate responded glumly, waving away his reprimand with her arms. "I mean, look at you and Felicia…"

"What about me and Felicia?" Frisco said, baffled.

"Well…knowing that Felicia loved you didn't keep you from getting angry and jealous when she came back and she moved in with Colton…you know," she ended on an almost-guilty note.

Frisco scoffed, not feeling an ounce of insecurity at all. "Woah, wait a minute! She didn't move in with Colton! I mean, she stayed there for a couple days, she didn't know what was happening with…with our situation, it wasn't a case of…'moving back in' or anything!"

Yeah, right, she'd move back in with Colton… completely ridiculous. He scoffed some more.

He glanced at Katie out of the corner of his eye, who shifted from one foot to the other and waited. And he slumped just a tiny amount.

"Alright, so it's not completely ridiculous, I guess I understand a bit…"

Kate grabbed his arm and leveled him with a look. "Frisco, just tell me, what is going on with those two?"

He stared at her. "Romantically, nothing…" At least as far as he knew, and Frisco felt confident that he at least knew them well enough to make that judgment. Robert wasn't the type to fool around and neither was Anna. He was sure of that. "Don't make yourself crazy. Professionally?" He hated to admit this, but… "I have no idea," he said flatly. "Now, you have to understand that they've shut me out of….a lot of things; Robert, Anna, and Sean…have kept a lot of secrets from me…"

It was painful to say this. And infuriating. Yes, Frisco understood their reasons for keeping him out of this, but it didn't mean he had to like it. He had been in the WSB long enough to get a sense of these things…and Frisco sensed that this particular case was big… big enough that all three of his friends were more tight-lipped than he had known them to be since…well, since he had met them. And that was definitely saying something.

"…and uh, there's nothing I can do about that."

"Exactly, exactly!" Kate pounced almost eagerly. "See, they don't trust you and me…!"

He could tell that she wanted to feel some camaraderie over this, to have a friend in isolation…but it wasn't the same thing.

"No, no, don't confuse the two," Frisco corrected quickly. "My situation wasn't a matter of trust, they were just…protecting me."

A conversation came to the forefront of Frisco's mind…many conversations, in fact. When Frisco had first joined the WSB, he remembered how he and Felicia were looking for guidance—how to navigate making the change of having a relationship while working for that kind of organization. He remembered Robert and Anna mentoring them both, and warning them about the cost to their personal life.

Boy…thinking back…how right they had been. It had almost cost him Felicia.

The voices of experience hadn't been as lucky to come out of it on the other end. Now, with Felicia expecting the baby…Frisco realized how close he had come to losing everything.

"…because they want me to be a good father. They want me to be good to my wife…and I'm the one who wanted to stay involved in the case." He sat down facing Katherine, his hands tilting upward honestly. "So it's actually my fault…"

"No, no, I understand that, I understand that," Kate rushed to amend, her hand sympathetically on his shoulder. She bent over him, trying to explain with an almost manic energy. "But didn't you want to know what was going on?!"

Frisco shrugged. "Well, you always want to know what's going on if you don't, sure."

"Yeah! Yeah, so what are you doing about it?!"

Frisco looked at her, taking in the desire to just know about the next adventure…he understood those feelings too. But unlike Kate, he understood what it all meant, and what was always at risk…things he could never make her understand and things that he frankly hoped she never had to. He and Sean and Anna and Robert had lived a life that was beyond explanation, in some ways. So, for Katherine (who was no professional spy by any stretch of the imagination), he knew what the best course of action was.

"I let it go, Katie," he said very clearly, and calmly observed the frantic edges of her expression and hoped what he said would get across. "Which is exactly what you should do."

Kate blinked back, visibly surprised at his answer. But when that wore off, she straightened up and put on a face, backing away from him. "I don't…I don't think I can." She groaned as she turned her back on him, disappointed.

Frisco stood with a sigh and tried again. "You've gotta look at it with the right perspective, here. You see, when you don't know and understand some things, you have to look at them differently." Kate was methodically swiping through her hair, disgruntled already, but Frisco pressed on. "Now Robert's a cop, right?"

"Mhmm…"

"And when these kind of things happen, when he doesn't show up, he's gonna be late, he ruins your little party like this?" Kate rolled her eyes and Frisco grinned. "Just pretend he's a shoe salesman! And he had to stay at work a little late."

Kate let out a sparse laugh and Frisco brightened a little more. "Huh?"

"I can't picture it." Kate shook her head, but she was definitely lighter.

"Trust me!" He pointed to the door leading out to the restaurant. "Ask Felicia…whenever I do things like this, she just thinks that I'm out on my paper route."

Katie laughed a little more freely this time and Frisco could see her coming 'round, though unwillingly. "You really think…I can do that?" she said uncertainly.

"It's worth a shot, 'cause you're a pain in the butt like this," Frisco joked.

"I am," Kate nodded good-naturedly. She took his hands and her smile became even more real. "Thank you. You know, not only are you an incredible gift to the music industry as my partner. You're an incredible friend." With that, she threw her arms around him and squeezed. "Thank you, thank you," she whispered.

Frisco couldn't believe that what he had turned around just a few HOURS ago could have gone so wrong, so fast…

"Katherine, I really don't understand this, I mean—"

"Look!" she put up a hand and her voice stabilized with more resolve. "It's done. You don't know what I heard; you don't know the whole story. And I think if you did, you'd see where I'm coming from."

"But I know Robert, Katie!" Frisco said loyally. "And I know you, and I know you two are—"

"Meant for each other!" Kate declared cynically, as if she had heard it a thousand times and meant less and less every time. "Well you're wrong, okay? You're wrong." Her voice brooked no room for argument and so he clamped his mouth shut as the blonde beauty swung around in the chair to face him, her eyes intent on his face. "Let me ask you something…yeah, let's talk about Colton and Felicia, okay? If you heard Felicia promise Colton that she would never allow them to be separated and that she would kill anyone who tried to take him away…if you heard Felicia calling out for Colton in her sleep…and on top of it all, she wouldn't tell you anything about what was going on…" She tilted her head to the side and squinted carefully at him. "Tell me, how would you feel?"

He didn't have to tell her. She was watching him too closely and he knew, even if it was just a flicker, that the truth was written all over his face. His mouth went dry and it felt like something inside him died for even thinking about the possibility of Felicia…and Colton…

"That happened?" Frisco said quietly, clearing his throat. He knew that Kate had just given him something that he might be able to connect to the case that his three friends had put on lockdown…

He had wondered about the others' investment in the mysterious island spook. They were all too uptight about their target to just chalk it up to pure business. And Robert and Anna…something was going on more than met the eye. There had to be. But for now, he tried to push it to the back of his mind and focus on the situation. There would be time to think about it later. And think about whether he should even think about it…

After being silent for a few moments, Kate shook her head heavily. "Everyone has been trying to tell me…to just let it go and love Robert. To close my eyes and pretend it isn't happening. But I can't, Frisco. This thing that Robert and Anna share? I'm telling you, it is personal. It's not normal. It's not just about Robin either. And, you know what?" Her smile was self-deprecating but also revelatory. And he knew that she was certain of this. "I am not …okay with it."

Every instinct in Frisco wanted to jump to the defense of two other people he held dear, because he really did know that neither of them would ever betray Kate, no matter what she heard. But he put a lid on it, because he was beginning to find out that he knew less than he thought he did about this. And he was not going to make false promises to anyone, especially his friends.

Meanwhile, Katherine closed her eyes and he saw a tear streak down her cheek as it caught the light. Deftly, he scooped it up with a finger and smiled at her with everything that he had. "Hey, none of that," he said. Kate didn't need his pity when she was hurting like this. She wasn't the type.

She bravely tried to smile back just to prove him right. "I don't want to talk about it anymore, okay? Why don't you go rev up the band for me, okay?" She wadded up the tissue in her hands and the conversation with it. "And, uh, no…sappy love songs. Just some rock n' roll!"

He hesitated at the front she was putting up, but when she was practically shoving him out the door, he stood and went to do as she wanted—gather the band and prepare for some rock. And he knew Katherine Delafield would be singing her heart out tonight.

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It wasn't until Frisco got home to Felicia that the finality of what Kate had said really hit him. And that put him into a brooding mood that set Felicia's senses off as he got into bed.

"Something wrong?" she asked pointedly, with that determined look on her cute face that told him she wasn't going to settle for a one-word response. He grimaced as he thought about how to word his thoughts, without mentioning anything about the case his friends were working on (because that would have been a really good way to end up in the doghouse), and slipped a comfortable arm around her.

"Nothing wrong with me…" he told her finally. "Kate and Robert broke up tonight."

In less than the time of a second, she sat up with a comical look of shock on her face. "What?"

"Yeah, I know…" he shook his head. "And you won't believe over what."

"What?"

"Anna. Robert's relationship with Anna."

Felicia stared at him with that same furrowed expression, but she didn't react immediately like Frisco expected her to. So he sat up and faced her… "You got nothing for that one?"

"Well, no…it's not that," she said slowly, contemplatively. "I just…I'm not surprised that this is a problem. I'm more surprised that it's a problem right now. What happened?"

"She didn't say exactly…just that Robert had said some things to make her think that there's still something between them." He wasn't about to bring up that horrible analogy Katherine made about Colton and Felicia. That was best forgotten.

"Oh no," Felicia gasped. "She couldn't think that!"

"Well—well, what did you mean before?" Frisco said. "You said you weren't 'surprised' that this was a problem. I mean, how do you think… " he trailed off, hoping she would fill in the blanks and get his meaning.

His wife looked at him with gentle eyes and sort-of smiled. "Sometimes I forget what you missed while you were gone with everybody else and not just us…"

They were treading around a sore subject here, so Frisco worked to stay on point. "When I was gone, Anna was with Duke. What could I possibly have missed?"

"Well…yes, Anna and Duke were together. But you know…" she gestured with a sort of flail that he couldn't interpret. "Robert and Anna are…really close…"

"Yeah…" Frisco drew out the word, watching her motion with her hands. "Honey, I'm not following."

"Well, Duke was jealous too!" Felicia said, as if that explained everything. "Even after they were married, he and Robert would be at each other's throats."

Without preamble, she left it at that and slipped off of the bed to head for the bathroom. She didn't shut the door the whole way so she could hear him if he said something. Frisco was staring a hole into the bedspread, trying to understand if women had to be cryptic all the time before they got to the actual point they wanted to make.

"Well, isn't that natural? I mean, Duke did some questionable things, and Robert has Robin to consider…it's natural that he would be protective of them…"

"Of course!" Felicia agreed, her voice echoing in the stillness. "But I don't think it's just about that."

"Well, what do you mean?" Frisco said impatiently, listening to the water turn on. She was back seconds later, wiping her damp hands against her sides.

"For instance, you weren't here when Anna was kidnapped by Grant Putnam." She bounced back into bed with him, but now her face was more serious as she settled her gaze on his face. He listened. "Robert was a wreck, Frisco. I've seen him with a lot of cases…but this was different. It was like he was possessed; he wasn't sleeping or eating and I was really afraid that if he didn't find Anna alive…" she bit her lip and didn't go on. "I was there for a lot of that, helping out. And thank God we found her…but even after, Robert had guards on Robin and Anna all the time, he was following Anna around after work, he was angry at Duke—oh, Duke! It was like they were competing over her, and the man who found her would be the winner. Duke was sure that Robert was still in love with her." She looked down at the bed. "And I don't know…there were times that I wondered if Duke was right about that."

"Nah…" he said reflexively, but he was really trying to imagine it… Frisco was never one to get wrapped up in people's personal business, so he wasn't very good at noticing this stuff. And it was easy to forget that he had missed a lot in the lives of his friends, because it was that much harder to think about…

"You didn't see him, Frisco," she repeated. Then she looked away before sinking invitingly back under the covers. "Now, nothing came of it and Duke and Anna were very happily married when it was all over. And now Robert's with—or was with Katherine, even though their wedding didn't happen. But you know, you can tell…"

"Tell what?" Frisco scoffed, following after her into the bed and relishing the warmth of his wife. How could he be unhappy when he had this? Those green eyes were sparkling carefully as Frisco brought his face close and kissed her on her pert little nose. And as he drew back, those eyes sparkled some more, tinged with a simple sort of wisdom and women's intuition.

"You can tell when two people say that there's nothing between them and that it's over…and maybe they're not lying exactly…but they're also not telling the whole truth. It's in how they look at each other…"

"Like how?"

Felicia lifted her chin. "Like you know in your head that it hurts too much to be with the person. But then you figure out that it hurts worse to be without them. And you have to make a decision."

"Yeah? …who're we really talking about here?" Frisco mumbled, his fingers sifting through her hair out of habit. The air in the room had changed. Sure enough, she dimpled up at him and patted his cheek.

"I'm glad I chose you."

With a grin, Frisco decided to forget about anything outside of this room and his wife and his child—the most important things in the world…Robert and Anna and Kate could keep until later.

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The shots came from his own gun and in the distance, two figures were thrown from the blast. Robert's feet pounded underneath him as he came to the right figure, dread strangling him. He dragged her away from the flames and reluctantly turned her over.

Anna, Anna, it was always Anna… Her exquisite face half-burned and bleeding, when just that morning she was a white rose blooming in his arms. That morning felt like a lifetime ago now...

He picked her up and carried her numbly and some piece of his mind couldn't forget how precious she was. Anna…why? Why?

And then suddenly the weight was gone and he was in a sanitized hallway with Sean, and Sean's mouth was moving but Robert couldn't hear him.

"What?" Robert threw Sean's placating hand off of his shoulder. "Listen. Where's Anna?! I—she was just here, I was holding her! Where did you put her?"

"It's no good, Robert," Sean said, and Robert could hear him this time. His jaw was rigid and his mouth grim. "You know what had to be done. I made a deal."

A deal. Robert suddenly remembered the truth—what he hadn't known then. "You—!" he lunged for Sean's throat, but Sean was suddenly out of reach.

"You were my best agents," he told him and the words reverberated in the empty hallway. "I wanted you back. You understand, right?"

"Where's Anna?!" Robert bellowed again, chest heaving.

"The explosion was never meant to happen, Robert." Sean's eyes crinkled with a sympathy that made Robert's stomach churn. "I had to give her back, you see? I had to give her to Faison."

His heart wouldn't beat. Sean's head tilted, observing something over his shoulder and Robert turned around to see the man himself.

This is Cesar Faison.

Anna was next to him, face bandaged and hopeless just as it was thirteen years ago. "Don't look at me like that," she whispered, and Faison held up a length of rope.

"You know the penalty for treason, Scorpio. You choose. Me…or this?"

"She didn't…" Robert was panting with fear. Anna wouldn't even look at him. He couldn't even control his words anymore. There was something important about this, but he couldn't remember. There wasn't time to remember! "It wasn't her," he swore. "It was the Swede! Sean! It was the Swede, damnit!"

Sean was right behind him, shaking his head at the sight in disappointment. "I'm sorry, Robert. I don't know what it is to love a woman…"

Faison lifted his arms to place the noose over Anna's head and Robert couldn't control himself.

"NO—!" he screamed and he catapulted forward, towards Anna and Faison and his legs got tangled in the blanket and he nearly fell off the couch. "—what?"

It was dark and quiet…and everything was still. He slowly caught his breath and it all came back to him.

Over. That was over. Years ago…

It was just a dream.

Anna had left him on the couch, it must have been hours ago. She was alive and Robin was alive, and they were sleeping only yards away from where he was.

It took everything in him not to check. He knew they were there. It was just a dream. Just a dream.

He was awake now…and there was no point in staying on the couch in these clothes, so he folded the spare blanket and gathered his keys up. He wouldn't write a note, Anna would know where he'd gone…back to the empty cottage. Besides, he'd be back in the morning to discuss the case...and maybe to discuss more than that.

He only spared a moment outside each of their doors, once he could just barely hear their soft breathing through the wood. They were there, and they were fine. They would both stay that way.

Robert's hands had ceased trembling by the time they gripped the car steering wheel.

A/N: Lots of Kate, Frisco, and even some Felicia! Robert here is probably going through a bit more than he did on the show too? That was a rough nightmare…but I figured, he has a history of dreaming things when he's upset (that typically cause him to call out for Anna lol), so why not? Let me know what you think! Anna will return in the next chapter!